


Pandora's Shadowbox

by CalicoCatMom



Category: Atlantis (UK TV), Warehouse 13
Genre: Crossover, Episode Related, Episode: s01e09 Pandora's Box, F/M, Greek Mythology - Freeform, Most times artifacts are dangerous, Pi Day, Post-episode s04e12 Parks and Rehabilitation, but once in a while they can be good, depression & grief, implied possible suicide
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-14
Updated: 2019-07-04
Packaged: 2019-11-17 13:30:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18099458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CalicoCatMom/pseuds/CalicoCatMom
Summary: In the wake of the worldwide catastrophes caused by the destruction of Pandora's Box and Artie's desperate and disastrous use of Magellan's Astrolabe to turn back time and prevent it, the Warehouse 13 team is exhausted after stopping the plague of the Chinese Orchid and saving Artie from himself, and they are mourning Leena.On Pi Day, they get a ping - then a series of pings - at an archaeological dig in Croton, Italy, a city that was once an ancient Greek colony. Some college students excavating the home of Milo of Croton have found something bequeathed to Milo by his famous relative Pythagoras of Samos.It's a box of dark brown wood, hexagonal, intricately carved - and looking all too familiar to Artie.Inside are Pythagoras' most precious keepsakes that he'd kept to the end of his long life, mementos of his dearest friends and his own greatest moment...





	1. Baked Goods

South Dakota, March 14, 2013 A.D. 7 am, Mountain Standard Time 

 

Pete Lattimer walked into the dining room of Leena’s Bed and Breakfast. He found his fellow Warehouse 13 agents Myka Bering and Steve Jinks sitting quietly at the table. “Hi guys,” he said. “Any idea why Claudia insisted that we come here now?” 

“No idea,” Steve replied without looking up. Myka shook her head glumly.

Pete sat down next to her. The atmosphere was subdued, and Pete knew it was due to their recent loss, the fact that Leena would not be there.

He tried again to get the others talking. “Where’s Artie? He’ll be here, won’t he?”

“Don’t know that either,” Steve said.

The door opened, and Claudia Donovan entered with a flourish. She wore a black t-shirt with the words ‘Guitar Queen’ emblazoned in gold, artfully distressed jeans, and a streak of bright purple in her chin-length auburn hair. “Good morning, fellow celebrants!” She handed them each a dessert plate, a fork, and a napkin.

“I take it we’re eating?” Pete said hopefully.

“That’s right!” Claudia replied. “Today is an important holiday, and we are going to participate in it!” With that she vanished out the door, but soon reappeared. “Ta-da!” she crowed, brandishing a hot pie in each hand before placing them on the table. 

Pete started salivating. One of the pies was Dutch apple, and the other looked like strawberry rhubarb. The aroma was enough to make his stomach growl, especially when Claudia added three more pies – peanut butter, pecan, and blueberry.

“Pie for breakfast?” Myka asked.

“Yes,” Claudia confirmed, folding her arms and putting her chin up. “Be a rebel!”

“Think of it as a breakfast pastry,” Steve suggested. 

“But what exactly are we celebrating?” Myka asked. 

Claudia grinned. “Today is Pi Day!”

The others looked at her blankly.

“It’s March 14th! Three point one four!” 

“Ohhhh!” Pete and Steve groaned. 

Myka smiled mischievously. “I can work with that! I get the circular logic!”

Claudia gave her a mock glare. “For that terrible, awful pun, I ought to throw this pie at you!”

“Now, now, no food fights, children!” Pete put in. “Ooh, I want blueberry!”

“I call strawberry rhubarb!” Myka announced.

“Dutch apple here,” Steve added.

“I know your favorites!” Claudia declared proudly.

“I once won a pie eating contest!” Pete said as he served them. “I bet I can eat that entire blueberry pie in less than a minute!”

“No, Pete, don’t. That is something none of us would ever want to watch!” Myka told him. “Just eat your pie like a normal human being!”

Right then the door opened, and Claudia called, “Hey, Artie! Happy Pi Day! Come have some pecan! I know that’s your favorite!”

Their supervisor’s expression, however, remained dour. “No time for that, Claudia, not anymore. We’ve got a ping!”

Claudia crossed her arms. “We won’t listen unless you eat some pie with us!”

Artie opened his mouth to rebuke her, but stopped when he saw the pecan pie. “Ooh, that looks good. Oh, all right, fine!” he said. Claudia grinned. Soon they were all eating.

“So what’s the ping?” Steve asked.

“An archaeological dig in Croton, Italy,” Artie replied with his mouth full. “A class of university students arrived and started working the site, and now there’s a mysterious sleeping sickness being reported. The victims start out with stiffness in their muscles and joints, and then they fall asleep and no one can wake them up. There’s been three so far, all students.”

“Sweet! I’ve never been to Italy! Or does being there on a day that got erased from the timeline and that I can’t remember count? Oh, never mind. Time travel makes my head hurt. The point is we’re going to Italy! I can’t wait to try real Italian cannolis!” Pete declared. 

“Really, Pete?” Myka said.

“Uh, I mean, what’s the site?” Pete asked. “An ancient Roman temple?” 

“It’s actually Greek,” Artie corrected. “Croton was a Greek colony long before the Romans got off the ground. Now listen. You’ll need to be very careful. Whatever this thing is - ”

A sharp beep interrupted him. Artie pulled out his Farnsworth. “Make that whatever these things are – that was another ping in Croton – they’re from the Archaic period, 6th century B.C.E. That predates Warehouse 1 by about two centuries! Anything that old is likely to be very powerful, especially if it hasn’t ever been found until now.”

“Come on, we’re always careful, Artie!” Pete protested.

Artie raised his thick salt-and-pepper eyebrows.

“All right, all right. We’ll be extra careful.”

“Good! Myka, I’m sending you because you speak Italian, and you, Pete –“

“Because I’ve got the physique of an ancient Greek god?” Pete flexed his muscles.

Myka, Claudia, and Steve all rolled their eyes.

“No, Pete,” Artie began. Then another beep interrupted him. “That’s another one,” he told them. “We may be dealing with an artifact with multiple parts. Claudia, you go with them.”

“Cool. I’ve got an app on my phone that I can set to translate Italian.”

“Yes, that’ll be useful. And there’s another ping! Steve –“

“No, please, Artie,” Steve said. “There’s still a huge backlog of artifacts to place in the Warehouse, and I’m still learning how to use the Feng Shui Spiral to figure out where they should go!”

“We can handle this, Artie!” Claudia assured him.

“Fine, but if there are any more, then you join them, Steve.”

“It’s a deal.”

“You three, when you get there, the first person you should talk to is the archaeology professor, Dr. Mara Singh. She’s in charge of the class at the dig, and she’s an expert on ancient Greece. Now grab your go bags and get out of here. I’ll have your plane tickets ready by the time you get to the airport!”

As he followed Myka and Claudia out, Pete asserted, “But I do have the physique of an ancient Greek god!” 

Claudia rolled her eyes again. “Whatever, Hercules. Let’s go.” 

 

As he returned to the Warehouse with Artie in the most recent addition to Artie’s collection of classic cars, Steve asked, “How is it that you can always make perfectly smooth travel arrangements for us? They always leave right when we need them to, we never have any problems making connections, and we never get bumped off overbooked flights!”

“Ah,” said Artie. “It’s the Scarab of Imhotep. As annoying as that thing is with its tunneling into the floor and being hard to catch, when I use it as a computer mouse to book your tickets, everything goes right. The scarab is the ancient Egyptian symbol for Khepera, the aspect of Ra the sun god that pushes the sun across the sky. This scarab therefore enables flights booked using it to go across the sky as smoothly as the sun.”

“Does that mean we can’t crash?”

“Unfortunately, no. It can’t fix a mechanical problem or do anything about an impaired pilot. But it can give you tailwinds and either help you avoid a storm or lessen its severity, and in the worst cases can prevent you from being struck by lightning. It also might be able to prevent midair collisions, but I’m not certain about that.” 

“That’s good to know. Artie, in cases when the artifacts we go after are both really dangerous and really far away, isn’t there a faster way to get there, like a teleportation artifact?”

“Yes, but – no!” Artie’s expression had turned grumpy. “There isn’t! When you misuse artifacts, as Pete would say, there’s always a downside, and sometimes it just doesn’t bear thinking about. Now, we’re back! Go get to work on that artifact backlog you were so concerned about. The Feng Shui Spiral isn’t going to spin itself!”

 

Croton, Italy, earlier that day, 9:30 am Central European Time:

 

Those girls were squabbling again. Jasmine Armstrong, Hayley Close, and Piper Grouse had done so continually throughout the entire study abroad archaeology course. Professor Mara Singh was sick of it. She’d assigned the three of them to work together in the hopes that they’d find a way to get along, but it wasn’t happening. Dr. Singh made her way toward them.

“I hate this class!” Piper complained. “I thought it would be fun to travel to Italy and see the sights and find some ancient Greek pots and stuff, but here we are grubbing in the dirt and not finding anything, and it’s so freaking hot and I’m getting so sunburned! This is going to ruin my skin!” The pale redhead’s arms and face had indeed turned a shade worthy of a sunset. “My hair is so dry too!”

“Piper Grouse, you are such a bird-brain!” Jasmine exploded, her dark braid falling off her shoulder. “Can’t you stop complaining for one moment and do your share of the work?”

“I am not and I am working! And even if I were a ‘bird-brain’, that would be better than a couch potato like you!” Piper sallied back.

“Couch potato? I’d like to see you cope with severe asthma! No, actually I wouldn’t. You’d complain even more, and it’d make you even more useless than you already are!”

Hayley, usually so shy, had apparently had enough. “Stop it! We’re all supposed to be getting this done!”

“Shut up, Hayley!” Jasmine said.

“We’re not paying attention to you, Hayley. Just like Miguel will never pay attention to you!” Piper added.

Despite her dark coloring, Hayley blushed deeply. 

Piper smiled and turned to Jasmine. “See, I’m not a bird-brain. I notice things.”

“So do I,” said Dr. Singh, coming up behind her. “And I’ve noticed that you three are still not getting your work done. If you don’t find a way to get along and keep up with the class, I am going to flunk all three of you!” She let her words sink in for a moment, then walked away.

Chastened, the girls turned back to their archaeology.

 

A short while later, Jasmine’s trowel struck something hard. “What’s this?” she asked. Hayley and Piper helped her, and they soon revealed the best preserved item found at the site so far. It was a wooden box, dark brown, hexagonal, and carved with curious markings that might be writing, but if they were, the language wasn’t Greek. They might be only decorative.

“Wow, look at that!” Hayley said. “We’d better find Dr. Singh!”

Piper ran to get their professor, who for the first time smiled at the trio when she saw what they’d found. “Good work,” Dr. Singh said. “Looks like you three are finally getting it together. Miguel’s got the camera today, so I’ll send him over. Start writing up a report, and don’t touch anything more until I get back and he’s photographed the box and its surroundings. I’ll go call this in.” Dr. Singh pulled out her cell phone as she walked away.

Soon their classmate Miguel Sanchez approached, holding a sophisticated camera.

“Hi, Miguel,” Hayley said. “Look what we found!”

“Cool,” the young man replied.

“It’s a box of some kind,” Hayley continued. “I can’t wait to see what’s inside.” 

“Well, we’ve got to get these pictures first,” Miguel said, “then maybe we can find out.”

Jasmine and Piper smirked as they began the group’s report. Hayley reluctantly went to work with them.

After a few minutes, Miguel intoned, “I’m done taking the photos.” 

Hayley looked up. Miguel’s voice didn’t sound quite right. He sounded preoccupied, or dazed. He stood staring at the half buried box, the camera forgotten in his hand. Hayley frowned. She knew that Miguel loved photography. He had eagerly awaited his turn with that fancy camera. What could be distracting him from it?

Miguel knelt back down and reached out to brush some dirt off the box’s lid.

“No, don’t do that!” Jasmine exclaimed. “Dr. Singh said not to touch anything yet!”

“We have to finish our report first!” Piper added.

“Miguel, what’s wrong?” Hayley asked.

He turned to look back at Hayley. “It’s calling to me,” he said.

“What?”

Instead of answering, Miguel let the camera fall with a soft crunch and pulled the box out of the ground.

“Miguel, no!” Hayley cried.

“It’s such a small, simple box,” he commented distantly as he examined it.

“Quick, put it back before anyone sees!” Jasmine insisted.

Miguel ignored her and moved to open the lid. The three girls tried to take the box from him, but the moment the four of them all touched it together, its mysterious markings glowed for a moment, and they all jerked back as if stung. Miguel managed to hold onto the box, but the lid fell off, and the contents spilled to the ground.

The four students examined the items. The box had contained a necklace in the shape of a long thin crescent like the horns of a bull, held on a surprisingly well preserved leather string. It also had contained a well-used stylus and a set of ancient dice.

Miguel replaced the lid on the box and held it tightly. Dreamily, Jasmine picked up the necklace, Piper took the stylus, and Hayley gathered up the dice.

Their eyes all met, and for just a moment, they reflected an ancient city now lost below the waves of the sea.

 

Atlantis, 543 B.C.E.

 

Jason gaped at the price the bread seller at the agora had just quoted him. “That’s twice as much as you charged last week!” he protested.

“That’s because it includes the amount that your friend Hercules owes me!” the merchant returned.

“Oh,” Jason said. “Why am I not surprised?” He shook his head in disgust and wiped the sweat from the late afternoon heat from his eyes. It seemed that due to over-fondness for wine, pies, and gambling, his rotund housemate owed money to almost everyone around. 

The merchant held his hand out. 

Jason sighed. “Fine. Here’s what he owes. That’s all I’ve got.” Jason gave the merchant the money with restrained vexation. What were he and Hercules and their other housemate Pythagoras going to do now? They were broke and without food, again. The temporary night watches and caravan guard jobs they got never paid very much. 

Just then Hercules and Pythagoras caught up with him. “So, have you got us bread?” Pythagoras asked.

Before Jason could answer, the merchant offered, “I’ll barter you a loaf for that necklace you’re wearing.”

Jason hesitated. His hand went to the bronze pendant at his throat. He felt the inverted crescent shape representing the horns of the sacred bull of Poseidon.

“Sounds like a reasonable trade to me!” Hercules said brightly.

Jason still didn’t move. The necklace was the last gift his father had given him before he disappeared, and it was now the last link he had. He remembered his father saying that he hoped it would someday show him his destiny. For that matter, it was when she saw the necklace that the Oracle seemed to recognize him when they first met, and she had said with hope in her eyes that he had a great destiny. Jason had no idea what she’d meant, but somehow the necklace seemed connected to both his future and his past. First it had been the key to trying to find his father; now it was the key to finding his place here in Atlantis. It was connected to his very identity and to all his hopes for his new life. 

He could not give that up. 

“Well, do it, Jason!” Hercules urged. “Make the trade!”

Jason faced the merchant. “No, thanks,” he said simply, and turned away.

“What do you mean, no, thanks?” Hercules pressed. “How are we going to eat?”

Trying to ignore his growling stomach, Jason replied, “We’ll find another way.”

“Oh, really?” Hercules asked. “What other way?”

“Leave it be, Hercules. The necklace is important to him,” Pythagoras murmured. 

“Then it looks like it’s up to me to provide our supper tonight!” Hercules declared. He drew his set of dice out of his pocket. “You two are lucky that I’m so skilled with these!” With that, Hercules left them.

“He’s headed to the tavern, isn’t he?” Jason said.

“Of course,” Pythagoras replied. “We shouldn’t wait up for him.” The redhead’s good-natured grin mirrored Jason’s own. “Come on. Maybe one of the merchants needs a storeroom guarded or a delivery made.”

“They might. I actually have a good feeling about that.”

As the two of them began to look for work, was it Jason’s imagination, or did the pendant feel comfortingly cool against his skin for just a moment, and a sudden breath of sea wind seem a proud paternal ruffling of his hair? 

Croton, Italy, March 14, 2013 A.D.:

 

Jasmine Armstrong held the bronze necklace in her hand. She had the strangest feeling that it was meant to belong to her, that she’d been destined to find it. Even though she knew she shouldn’t, she slowly put the pendant around her neck and tucked it under her shirt. A warm restorative glow filled her for a moment. Yes, this was right.

She looked up to see Piper quietly pocketing the stylus she’d picked up, and Hayley doing the same with the ancient set of dice. Miguel still clung to the hexagonal wooden box.  
Jasmine gave her friends a knowing smile.

Wait, her friends? Jasmine hazily remembered arguing with Piper and Hayley, but whatever it was about couldn’t have been important. They were a team; they were like sisters, and as for Hayley and Miguel, the sooner those two realized they liked each other and started dating, the better. Maybe Piper would help Jasmine push them together.

Miguel’s expression was changing. His eyes were widening and his breath quickening in fear rapidly heading toward absolute blind panic. “This box,” he whispered. “It’s… evil! I’ve got to make sure no one can ever open it again!”

Then he bolted. 

“Miguel! Where are you going?” Hayley called. 

He just kept running. Jasmine heard him yell, “Let me through!” as he barreled right toward Daniel, Toby, and Katya, the students who were working near the exit to the dig site. He pushed past them, nearly knocking Toby down and ignoring the shock on their faces.

Hayley ran after him.

Piper followed.

Forgetting all about her asthma, Jasmine sprinted after them. They were going to need her. She felt strong, stronger than she had in a long time.

 

A few minutes later, Dr. Singh stopped in her tracks. Where were the students who had found the box? Then she saw the camera on the ground. Oh, no, was it damaged? She picked it up and scrolled through its memory. Miguel had taken skillful pictures of the find – but then Dr. Singh nearly dropped the camera again. The actual box was missing from the dig.

“Um, Dr. Singh?” came a student’s voice behind her.

She turned. “What is it, Toby?”

“What’s going on?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, Miguel just suddenly took off out of here, and Piper and them went with him. It was weird. They nearly knocked me over. Is there some kind of emergency?”

“No, Toby. There’s no emergency,” Dr. Singh said, though it sounded unconvincing even to her own ears. “Just tell me when they get back.”

“Oh, okay,” Toby said.

No, it was definitely not okay, Dr. Singh thought. An ancient artifact had just been stolen from an Italian archaeological dig by American students. This could become an international incident! Dr. Singh closed her eyes. This wasn’t an emergency. It was a disaster.

“Um, Dr. Singh?” the student said again.

“Yes, Toby?”

“I don’t feel good, Professor. I feel all stiff and sore all of a sudden, and really tired…” 

“Okay. You’re probably just getting a bit dehydrated. Why don’t you sit down and drink some water –“

Toby collapsed.

Dr. Singh’s emergency training kicked in. “Students!” she yelled as she eased Toby to the ground. She reflexively pointed to the first student she made eye contact with. “Call 112!” The second student she saw got the instruction, “Get the first aid kit from the truck!” The third one she told, “Get the defibrillator!” 

As she checked Toby’s breathing and examined him for injuries, another student shrieked, “Dr. Singh! Daniel and Katya both just passed out!”

“Anyone who has certified first aid training, go help them!” Dr. Singh yelled. This situation was a teacher’s worst nightmare, she thought. Could anything make it worse?


	2. That... is Troubling

Croton, Italy, March 15, 2013 A.D.

 

“Hey, hey, hey! You must be Professor Singh!” The dark-haired man, probably in his thirties, who entered Dr. Singh’s hospital quarantine room was trying too hard to be charmingly jaunty. To her it made him seem immature instead. 

She gave him a small, chilly smile. “Yes, I’m Dr. Mara Singh. And you are?”

Two women had accompanied the annoying man into the room, and the one with the dark curly hair stepped forward authoritatively, giving her companion a sideways look. “I’m Agent Myka Bering, and these are my partners, Pete Lattimer and Claudia Donovan,” she said, and flashed a badge. The man, Lattimer, flashed one too. 

“Well, Agents,” Dr. Singh said, “Why would the Embassy get the Secret Service involved in a medical situation?”

Bering and Lattimer exchanged surprised glances that she’d read their badges so rapidly from a dozen feet away. Dr. Singh allowed herself a moment of satisfaction. She wasn’t one to let university administrators, athletic coaches, tiger moms, or federal agents steamroller her.

Lattimer replied, “They didn’t.” He lowered his voice. “We’re involved in trying to recover what was stolen from your dig.”

“That is not common knowledge,” Dr. Singh said, keeping her tone carefully neutral.

“We know,” Bering replied. “The President is in delicate negotiations with the Italian government right now about trade regulations. He doesn’t want anything to disrupt them, so we’re here to try to solve this quickly and quietly. We need to find your missing students, find out what happened yesterday and why, and get back what was taken.”

Something in the agents’ aspects made Dr. Singh suspect that they weren’t saying everything they knew. She also noted that the third member of their party, the auburn-haired girl named Donovan, looked too young to be a Secret Service agent, had not flashed a badge, and was studying the security technology in the room instead of taking part in the conversation. Nevertheless, the agents’ objective did align with her own, so Dr. Singh decided to accept their answer, for now. “How can I help?” she said. “I can’t believe these students are antiquities thieves! They’re just ordinary kids! And I’m worried about the ones who are ill. None of them have wakened. The fact that the two things happened at the same time is really strange. ”

“Well, I’ve heard about incidents when archaeologists have accidentally released contaminants that have lain dormant in ancient structures for a long time. Isn’t that why there were rumors of curses on Egyptian tombs? What if that’s why your students became ill, and maybe the ones who took the artifact became delusional from the disease and not known what they were doing?” Bering suggested.

Dr. Singh nodded. “Those incidents are beyond rare, but they have happened. It’s called paleopathology. That’s why we’re here under observation. I wish I could say it was impossible, but I can’t.”

“Another possibility is that someone wants something valuable from the site, and found a way to coerce the students, and the sickness is just coincidence. Or it might be something else altogether. Anything you can tell us about your dig might help us figure it out.”

“All right. The site is the home of Milo of Croton, from the 6th century B.C.E. He was an Olympic wrestler, a soldier, and a Pythagorean, a follower of the philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras of Samos.”

“Pythagoras? You mean the triangle guy?” Lattimer asked.

“Yes, the mathematician of Pythagorean theorem fame. In fact, Milo was a relative of Pythagoras by marriage.”

Lattimer, Bering, and Donovan shared a significant look that Dr. Singh couldn’t interpret.

“Did any incidents of particular importance happen at his house?” Bering asked.

“Actually, yes. The original Pythagoreans, as they grew in numbers, became quite politically powerful, and because of that, they made enemies. Pythagoras was also particular about who he allowed to join, and that made him and his school, or community, enemies as well. There was a rich and powerful man named Cylon of Croton who tried to join the Pythagoreans, but Pythagoras turned him away because Cylon was also a conceited braggart and had a violent temper. In about 495 B.C.E., Cylon stirred up a mob that attacked a Pythagorean gathering at Milo’s house. They burned the house down, and about 35 or 40 Pythagoreans died. The records are inconclusive and inconsistent about exactly what happened, but the version I find most likely says that Pythagoras himself escaped, and fled to Metapontum, but he was so heartbroken at the deaths of his followers that he succumbed to depression and grief and starved himself to death there at the Temple of the Muses.”

“How very sad.”

“Yes. He’d lived a long life though. He was 75 years old, which was rare for the time.”

“What were your students working on right before they fell ill?”

“Well, the group that went missing had just found a very well preserved wooden box. That’s the artifact that was stolen.” Dr. Singh recounted what had happened the previous day in as much detail as she could remember. “I actually have the photos that Miguel Sanchez took of the box right before he and the three girls disappeared,” she concluded.

The agents’ eyes lit up, especially Donovan’s. “If you could show us those photos, that would be great,” Lattimer said.

“Ordinarily I couldn’t. There are strict protocols about sharing unpublished archaeological information. However, since you are federal agents, and these are extraordinary circumstances, I believe I can.” Dr. Singh opened her laptop. “I’ve been working on my reports, so I’ve already downloaded them.”

Donovan then spoke for the first time. “Could you please email copies to me?” She pulled her tablet out of her bag.

“What’s the address?”

Donovan gave what sounded like a personal email address.

Dr. Singh frowned. “Not Secret Service dot gov?”

“I’m a contractor,” Donovan clarified. “A tech specialist.”

Well, that did explain the interest in the room’s technology and the lack of a badge. Dr. Singh was already preparing the email.

Donovan’s tablet beeped. “Got it. Thanks,” she said.

The three agents peered at the tablet screen.

“There’s one other thing…” Dr. Singh added. “It’s about the missing students.”

The agents refocused their attention on her.

“It’s strange,” she reflected. “The three girls, Jasmine, Hayley, and Piper, they’d been driving me crazy with their arguing. They couldn’t get along for five minutes. Then they discover this box, and suddenly they act like they’re best friends, and Miguel too.”

“Yes, that is strange. Thank you, Dr. Singh,” Bering replied. “May we come back and talk with you again if we have more questions later?”

“Certainly. Here’s my card. Keep me informed about your progress.”

“Of course.” Bering gave Dr. Singh a business card in return. “You know, we have a contact at the CDC who we can alert about all this. Maybe she can be of assistance.”

“Thank you,” Dr. Singh said.

After the Secret Service agents were gone, Dr. Singh realized something. Jasmine Armstrong was severely asthmatic. With her condition, how did she manage to race off from the dig site with the others like that? It was yet one more thing about this whole situation that just didn’t make sense. Dr. Singh shook her head, hoping that wherever the girl was, that she had her medication with her. 

 

“Wow,” Pete commented as the Warehouse team left the hospital. “We’re going to have to be careful what we say around that professor. She’s really sharp.”

“Yeah, and I think she was serious about us keeping her updated,” Claudia agreed.

Myka barely heard them. She was already calling Artie on her Farnsworth. “Artie!” she exclaimed. “We just talked to the archaeology professor. The artifacts may have something to do with either Milo of Croton or Pythagoras!”

“Did you find out what was taken from the archaeology dig?”

“It was a wooden box. It didn’t sound like Dr. Singh had opened it. The artifacts must have been inside.”

“What does it look like?”

“I’ve got pictures, Artie. Dr. Singh let us have the documentary photos from the dig. I’m emailing them to you now!” Claudia chimed in.

When Artie saw the photos, he froze, his expression horrified. “Oh, no! No, it can’t be! Not again!” he shouted.

“What’s wrong, Artie?” Myka asked.

“I’ve got to go check something. In the meantime, whatever you do, do not open that box! Don’t even touch the box! And don’t make eye contact with any of those college students!” Artie instructed, then broke contact before Myka could respond.

“That was weird,” Pete remarked.

“Well, remember, we specialize in weird,” Myka returned.

“No, that wasn’t weird at all,” Claudia disagreed. “Artie shouted at us, barked some orders, didn’t answer any questions, and then hung up. Perfectly normal!”

Pete inclined his head. “She has a point.”

“So,” Claudia said, “how do we find those runaway college students?”

Myka considered. “Well, where they’ve gone will depend on what they’re planning to do with the box.”

“And whatever might be inside it,” Pete added. “We need to find out exactly what those kids have got their hands on.”

Myka nodded. “We need to find out more about Pythagoras and about Milo of Croton.” 

“I’ll send a text to Dr. Singh and ask what that meeting was about when Cylon sent the mob to attack Milo’s house,” Claudia offered. 

“Good. We should also see if we can check out the missing students’ dormitory rooms. Maybe there’ll be clues about where they’ve gone,” Pete suggested. 

Myka assented. “It’s a start.”

 

South Dakota, March 15, 2013 A.D. 

 

Artie couldn’t get to the Eturbian Chamber fast enough. It shouldn’t be possible for those kids in Croton to have found Pandora’s Box! It was here, well protected in the Warehouse! How could it be buried in Croton? Artie tried to fight off panic. Could his use of Magellan’s Astrolabe to turn back time and change events somehow have caused Pandora’s Box not to have been found until now? If Pandora’s Box had been opened again – 

He nearly crashed into Steve. “Whoa, Artie! What’s the rush?” Steve asked. 

“Come with me! We’ve got to make sure the whole disaster we just survived isn’t happening again!” 

“What?” 

“Pandora’s Box! Just come!” 

“Okay, okay.” 

They arrived at the door to the Eturbian Chamber, and with trembling hands Artie began entering the passcodes. There were four of them, and they had to be entered in the correct order. That would then release the fingerprint scanner – 

“Arthur, what are you doing?” came a contralto female voice behind him. 

Artie jumped. “Oh! Mrs. Frederick! I didn’t hear you come in!” 

“I’ve gotten rather used to hearing you say that. It does not, however, answer my question,” Mrs. Frederick returned dryly. 

Artie turned to look at her. The Caretaker of Warehouse 13, a formidable African-American lady with rectangular glasses and one gray streak in her hair, gazed right back with an expectant quirk of her eyebrow. As usual, she wore a severely cut skirt suit with perfectly matching heels and a strand of very large pearls. On her, powder pink was just as much a ‘power color’ as the most businesslike black or navy. Only someone as intimidating as Mrs. Frederick could pull that off. 

“I’ve got to make sure Pandora’s Box is still in the Eturbian Chamber!” Artie told her. 

“Why?” she persisted. “Does this have to do with your recent troubles?” 

“No! ... Yes! ... I don’t know,” he faltered. 

“Explain. Why would Pandora’s Box be missing?”

Artie showed her his Farnsworth. “Claudia just sent me these photos from an archeological dig in Italy!” 

“That… is troubling,” Mrs. Frederick said. She squared her shoulders. “Agent Jinks and I will enter the Eturbian Chamber and check the status of Pandora’s Box. You should return to your office and research this archaeological dig.”

“You want Steve to come with you and not me?”

“That is correct.”

“Why?” Steve asked before Artie could.

“Your particular talents should be employed where they are most useful, should they not?” Mrs. Frederick replied. She was already entering the next passcode for the door.

“Whose talents?”

“Both of you. Now, I will have the chamber open momentarily. Go ahead and get started on your research, Arthur. We will meet you shortly.”

“All right,” Artie replied. What else did one say to Mrs. Frederick?

 

Croton, Italy, the previous day

 

Hayley Close couldn’t run anymore along the streets of Croton. Her limbs felt leaden. As she felt herself slowing, she yelled Miguel’s name one more time.

“Don’t follow me, Hayley! This thing’s dangerous! I’m dangerous!” Miguel called back. 

Hayley, breathing hard, had to stop, and Miguel vanished from sight. Hayley fought back tears. She loved him so much. How could she help him now? She smiled sadly at what he’d said to her. He wanted to keep her safe. He did care about her! A spark of newfound self-confidence ignited inside her.

Piper then came up alongside Hayley, panting. She looked exhausted too.

Only Jasmine, who arrived moments later, had any energy left. “Come on! We’ve got to catch up to him!” she exclaimed.

Piper, still breathless, could only shake her head.

“We’ve lost him, Jasmine,” Hayley murmured. She hazily remembered Jasmine and Piper teasing her about Miguel and making her blush, but it had all been good-natured, hadn’t it? After all, they now wanted to help her.

When she’d caught her breath, Piper turned to Jasmine concernedly. “Your asthma, Jasmine! Are you okay?”

Jasmine blinked, then nodded. “Yeah, I’m fine. It’s like it’s not even there!” Her shock transformed to a delighted smile.

Hayley looked off in the direction Miguel had gone. “What are we going to do now?” she asked. Everyday activity was occurring around them along the street, and a few passersby gave them annoyed looks for blocking the sidewalk. “We can’t stay here,” Hayley pointed out as they moved aside.

Piper’s shoulders slumped. “We’re going to be in so much trouble!” she groaned.

Jasmine addressed them both with a determined tone. “Not if we find Miguel, and find out what he meant about the box being evil. We need to get it back to the dig site and give it to Dr. Singh. She’ll know what to do with it.”

Piper put her hand in her pocket where she had the ancient stylus. “Um, you guys? Do you think these other things we found are evil too?” she asked, barely above a whisper.

Hayley’s hand also went to her pocket where she had the dice, and Jasmine clasped the pendant as she frowned in thought.

“When Miguel handled the box, it made him feel terrified. How does the stylus make you feel?” Jasmine asked.

“Focused,” Piper replied.

“And Hayley, what about the dice?”

“Confident,” Hayley answered.

“The necklace makes me feel strong,” Jasmine confided. “Those are all good things. I think we were meant to have these items, in order to help Miguel.”

Hayley and Piper nodded in relief.

“Now, next, we need a plan,” Jasmine said.

“Right,” Piper replied. “Miguel said he has to make sure nobody can ever open the box again. He’ll need some time to figure out how to do that. Where would he go for a quiet place to think?” Her eyes acquired a mischievous glint. “If only we knew someone who knows Miguel better than you and I do, Jasmine. Maybe someone who contrived to get herself assigned to his study group so she could spend time with him?”

Jasmine smiled slyly. “If only.”

Hayley rolled her eyes. “Very funny.” Her mind began sorting through everything she could remember Miguel saying. “It wouldn’t be a quiet place he’d go to,” she realized. “He likes white noise around instead. That’s why he always wants our study group to meet in the student union or at a café rather than the library. Wait, that’s it! There’s a certain café he likes! The one on the next block with the big green sign outside! I think it’s the closest place he might go.”

“Then there’s our answer,” Jasmine said. “Let’s go!”

“Wait,” Piper interjected. “What do we say to him to keep him from bolting again when we get there? How do we convince him to return the box? What if he’s not even there? We might have a long search ahead, and Dr. Singh’s probably already getting people to look for us. We’re on the run, and we need supplies.”

“Okay,” Jasmine acknowledged. “Our dorm is near enough. Let’s just make the briefest of stops and grab what we’ll most need. Pack light and quick and inconspicuous. We’ll need to be gone before anyone sees us there.”

“We can be at the dormitorio in two minutes, take no more than two minutes to get our things, and then get out,” Piper figured.

“Then let’s do it,” Hayley agreed.

“I still think we’re going to be in trouble,” Piper told them.

 

A short while later, Hayley dumped her backpack on the concrete and flopped dejectedly into a chair at an outdoor table in front of the café. Miguel wasn’t here, and when Piper had asked the waitstaff in her passable Italian, they did not recognize his description.

“We’ll find him, Hayley,” Jasmine said, sitting next to her. 

“We just need to think like him,” Piper suggested. “Now, what do we know? He’s determined to make sure that no one ever opens the box again. That implies that he wants to hide it permanently or destroy it. How would he do that?”

“Well, where would nobody ever find it? What would destroy it?” Jasmine asked.

“When Miguel was talking about photography the other day,” Hayley recalled, “he said his favorite thing is landscapes with the forces of nature at work in them. He said he loves capturing the awe-inspiring power of nature that’s far beyond human capability. I think he’ll find a natural force to hide or destroy the box because it’ll be powerful beyond his capability and he can be sure the box is gone.”

Just then a waitress came to the girls’ table and asked for their order in Italian.

The girls looked at each other. They hadn’t intended to order anything.

The waitress seemed to pick up on this. “These tables are for customer use only,” she said, with Piper translating.

“Then let’s get a late lunch,” Jasmine said to her friends. “I am actually kind of hungry.”

“Me too,” Piper realized, and the waitress handed them menus.

“Sandwiches and sodas, everyone?” Jasmine asked.

Hayley nodded, but turned her menu over and asked, “Is there a dessert page? I’ve got a crazy craving for pie, and a glass of wine.” Her brow wrinkled in confusion. Where had that come from? She didn’t drink, yet it sounded wonderful right now.

“Wine, Hayley?” Piper asked in surprise. “I know we’re not underage for buying alcohol here like we are at home, but we all need to be at our sharpest right now.”

“Okay, just the pie, then.” 

Piper ordered sandwiches and sodas for all of them, and three slices of the chocolate pie pictured on the menu. “This’ll be my treat,” she offered.

“Are you sure, Piper?” Jasmine asked.

Piper nodded ruefully. “Money is one of the few advantages to being the second daughter of the great Morrison and Judith Grouse. My sister Ashley is the one who gets all the attention. She’s everything my parents want, MBA and all, and she’s being groomed to inherit the company. My parents didn’t know what to do with me until they saw that I’m organized. Then they decided I’d major in hospitality management so I can become the company and family event planner. Yeah, right. In reality I’m going to end up being Ashley’s gopher.” Piper wrinkled her nose. “I don’t want to be either one, but my family won’t hear of anything else.”

“What do you want to do instead?” Jasmine asked.

“I don’t know. I like math, and I like psychology, and I like music, but I’m not sure what to do with any of it. I’ve been playing the piano since I was seven. I wanted to learn the harp, too, but my parents wouldn’t let me. They have this beautiful orchestral concert harp in the parlor, but they said it’s a decorator piece and nobody should touch it.” She suddenly sat up. “I don’t want to talk about this anymore. We need to figure out how to find Miguel.”

“Right,” Jasmine straightened too. “Hayley, you said something about natural forces? How would Miguel go about using natural forces to get rid of the box?”

“Well, we’re only a few minutes from the beach. He could bury the box in the sand,” Hayley said.

“That wouldn’t be permanent,” Piper cautioned. “Someone would eventually dig it up.”

“What about the sea? He could go out in a boat and throw the box into the water.”

“That’s a better idea, but there’s still a chance that someone might find it eventually.”

“Then what if he plans destroy it instead of hide it?” Jasmine put in.

“Still the beach?” Hayley speculated. “Miguel might build a fire out of driftwood and burn the box. It’s near water and away from any buildings.”

“That’s a possibility,” Piper mused.

“There’s also the cliffs,” Hayley continued. “He might go up to one of the overlooks and pitch the box into the sea from there. It’s rocky close to the shore, so the box would smash.”

“That sounds possible too.”

“If we’re having trouble figuring it out, maybe Miguel is too,” Jasmine suggested. “There are a couple of abandoned buildings near the dig site, and there might be more around. Maybe he’d duck into one of those until he’s decided what to do.”

“I hope not,” replied Piper. “Those places are likely unsafe, and it would seriously lessen our chances of finding him because we have no idea where they all might be.” 

“Oh, no,” murmured Hayley. 

“So what do you guys think? The beach, the cliffs, or abandoned buildings?” Jasmine asked after a moment.

“We could split up,” Hayley suggested.

Piper shook her head, “No, we need to stay together. If we split up, we won’t be able to communicate. Remember, we left our phones behind so they can’t be used to track us.”

Hayley sighed. “Then I guess we’ll just have to roll the dice and pick one.”

The girls’ lunch arrived just then. “Oh, yum!” Hayley declared. “Pie!”

 

Atlantis, 543 B.C.E.

 

“Yes! I win again!” Hercules crowed. “Just look at that roll! I did warn you that my skill with dice is unrivaled!” He chortled as he gathered up his winnings from the tavern table. It was the most he’d won at gambling in a long time. Jason, Pythagoras, Critias, and several other taverngoers cheered him on.

His opponent in the dice game just smirked and took another drink. “You’ve simply been lucky, my friend, and luck, no matter how good, doesn’t last!”

“Oh, no, it was more than luck, my friend!” Hercules retorted. “A lot more!”

“Then how about another round? Double stakes?”

“Yeah, Hercules!” egged on Critias. “Go for the really big win!”

Hercules considered, then smiled. “You know, I think I will!” Then he drained his wine cup, took his dice, and got up from the table.

“Where are you going?” Critias asked. “The sun hasn’t even set yet!”

Hercules’ smile grew. “The biggest win of my life is my lady’s heart!” he said. With that he headed for the door.

“Ah. He’s going to see Medusa,” he heard Pythagoras clarify.

“You can have my place in the dice game if you want, Critias!” Hercules called over his shoulder as he headed out into the early evening.

 

Soon Hercules knocked on Medusa’s door. She answered, and smiled when she saw him. “Hercules! This is a nice surprise!” she said. He produced a bouquet of wildflowers from behind his back and handed it to her. “How lovely!” she responded. “Thank you!”

“I thought I would take a gamble that you were at home and came to invite you out for an evening stroll,” Hercules suggested. “We could walk along the ridge and watch the sun set over the sea, get some pies to take with us and eat along the way, have a good talk about whatever you like…”

“That sounds delightful,” Medusa said, still smiling.

“Then shall we?”

Medusa took his offered arm, and Hercules led the way.

The two of them were focused on each other, so neither noticed a brief flash of light coming from Hercules’ belt pouch where he had secured his gambling dice.

 

South Dakota, March 15, 2013 A.D.

 

Artie heard Steve before he saw him. The former ATF agent burst into the office with Mrs. Frederick at his heels. He looked relieved, she inscrutable. “Artie! Pandora’s Box is still in the Eturbian Chamber!” Steve exclaimed.

“And before you ask, yes, it remains unopened,” Mrs. Frederick added.

“That is really good news, because I’m finding almost nothing useful about Milo of Croton!” Artie replied, unable to keep the frustration from his voice.

“I could hear the box calling to me,” Steve said. “Well, not calling, exactly, because it wasn’t in words. It was more of an impression, saying it was safe to open it. And it was a lie.”

Artie regarded Steve for a brief moment, then turned to Mrs. Frederick. “So that’s what you meant by our talents being employed where they’re most useful,” he said.

She inclined her head. “Partially,” she acknowledged.

“Wait a minute,” Artie realized. “If the real Pandora’s Box is here, then what have those archaeology students found buried in Croton?”

The three of them looked at each other for a moment. Then Mrs. Frederick answered, “Someone at some point must have made a replica.”


	3. All Roads Lead to Rome

Atlantis, 543 B.C.E.

 

It was a horrible shock that Medusa had been turned into a Gorgon when she opened Pandora’s Box, and had as a result fled the city. Hercules was inconsolable. “She wouldn’t even say where she was going!” he lamented. “I can’t believe I’ll never see her again!”

Pythagoras tried to comfort him, promising that he would do everything he could to find a cure for her. Hercules barely seemed to hear him.

Jason sat nearby, still fuming. He’d gone to the Temple to give Pandora’s Box to the Oracle for safekeeping, and he’d come back outraged. He’d quietly told Pythagoras that the Oracle had accepted the box but otherwise refused to help, and had actually acted like this was how it was supposed to be! “Whatever you do, don’t tell Hercules,” he’d finished.

“Don’t worry,” Pythagoras had answered. “I think you were right to spare him.”

The three of them sat without speaking, Hercules at the table with his head in his hands, Pythagoras next to him with his arm around his friend’s shoulders, and Jason on the other side of the room sitting on his bed.

Someone knocked on the door. Pythagoras looked up in confusion. It was really late for anyone to be coming by. Neither Hercules nor Jason moved, so Pythagoras went to answer it. He found Melas there at the doorstep, and let him in. 

Jason glared at the high priest. “If the Oracle is summoning me, I’m not coming,” he declared bluntly. “Not unless she tells me how to cure Medusa.”

“Sorry,” Pythagoras added as an aside. “He’s not taking… tonight’s events… very well.”

“That’s quite all right,” Melas replied. “It is actually you the Oracle wishes to see.”

“Me?” Pythagoras asked in surprise. “Why?”

“You will find out soon enough. Come.”

Pythagoras looked back at Jason.

“Oh, just go,” Jason snapped. “I’ll stay with Hercules.”

 

Melas led Pythagoras down the Temple’s back stairs and into the Oracle’s audience chamber. She awaited them there, her presence otherworldly and enigmatic, though not sinister, in the dim, flickering light from the torches and candles. Pythagoras found the intensity and urgency of her gaze a bit unnerving. Melas, however, still appeared unfazed.

“Pythagoras,” the Oracle said without preamble, “What became of the replica of Pandora’s Box that you and Jason and Hercules gave to Kairos?”

Pythagoras tried to recall what happened in the chaos as they rescued Medusa from her kidnapper. “Kairos dropped it when he saw the viper Jason had put inside it and realized that it wasn’t the real box,” he said. “We tried to flee, but his followers came after us. We fought them, and Jason killed Kairos… I suppose the box is still there at Kairos’ place.”

“I must ask you to do something. It is a small task, but one that will have repercussions far into the future.”

“What is it?”

“You must retrieve the replica box.”

“All right. I’ll bring it to you.”

“No! You must keep it, always keep it. It is a shadow of Pandora’s Box, but the two must never meet until the predestined time, and that will only happen after thirteen empires.”

This made very little sense to Pythagoras, but he trusted that the Oracle would not have sent for him in the middle of the night if it weren’t important.

“Is the replica safe to use?” he asked.

The Oracle paused, then nodded. “It is safe for you, and for the others involved in its creation, and when the time comes, it will be safe for your chosen heirs, but it will not be safe for anyone else, especially outside Atlantis,” she replied. “That is all the gods have shown me.”

Pythagoras supposed that had to be enough. “Very well,” he said. “I will retrieve it.”

 

As he reapproached the building from which he and his friends had so recently fled for their lives, Pythagoras breathed a quick prayer asking Poseidon for strength to face the scene he was likely to encounter inside, and afterward to face his housemates, who he knew would raise vociferous objections to the Oracle’s directive.

Pythagoras then saw soldiers at the building’s entrance. The commotion of the fight must have attracted the city guard. Pythagoras turned the next corner as casually as he could, then ducked into the darkest nearby shadow. He would have to hide until the soldiers left. If he showed any association with that building, the guards would probably arrest him.

He endured a mix of anxiety and boredom until he no longer heard any voices or footsteps. A cautious peek confirmed that the street was now empty. Pythagoras darted the rest of the way to Kairos’ building and slipped inside.

As he expected, the soldiers had not done any cleanup of the premises. Pythagoras checked to make sure the viper was not in evidence anywhere, then warily crossed the room. He tried not to think about the results of the fighting when he and his friends had defended themselves against Kairos and his followers. He began to feel ill anyway.

There lay the box, still right where Kairos had dropped it on the floor. Pythagoras snatched it up, placed the lid back on it, and got out of there as quickly as he could. 

 

When he got home, Pythagoras opened the door quietly, but his housemates were both still awake and sitting where he had left them. Jason looked up, and when he saw what Pythagoras was carrying, his jaw dropped.

“The Oracle gave you Pandora’s Box?” he choked.

Hercules’ head snapped up. “Get that thing away from me!” he snarled, pointing at it with his eyes flashing. “I never want to see it again!”

“You haven’t opened it, have you?” Jason pressed.

“Listen!” Pythagoras placated. “This isn’t the real Pandora’s Box. It’s the replica that we had made for Kairos. The Oracle said it is safe, at least for us.”

“I don’t care!” Hercules thundered. “I will not have that thing anywhere around!” 

“She sent you back there where Kairos’ thugs could have caught you?” Jason exploded. “I am sick and tired of her commanding and manipulating all of us and putting us in mortal danger and not even telling us why!” 

Both of them rounded on Pythagoras and tried to snatch the box away from him.

“No!” With a flash of panic Pythagoras resisted, though he knew that both his friends were far stronger than he was. “The Oracle said I always have to keep it!”

Unexpectedly, he somehow managed to pull the box away. The decorative carvings on its edge must have dug into his hand as he did so, because his right palm stung for a few seconds as if he had touched a spark. Jason and Hercules both looked just as surprised as Pythagoras was by his sudden flash of strength. 

Then Hercules scowled again and rubbed his hands on his shirt. “She may have said you have to keep it, but I will have nothing to do with it!” 

“You don’t have to,” Pythagoras assured him. “I will put it away where you do not have to see it.”

“See that you do!” Hercules growled.

“Why does the Oracle want you to keep it?” Jason demanded, shaking out his hand.

Pythagoras shrugged. “She said something about it being destined to join the real one after thirteen empires, but that the two must not meet until then. I do not understand it, but she said it was important.”

“Then put it away, and let us never speak of it again!” Hercules insisted. Jason nodded.

Pythagoras complied. It was what he had intended all along.

 

Croton, Italy, March 15, 2013 A.D.

 

Myka Bering led her compatriots to the Biblioteca Comunale Armando Lucifero. Surely the Croton library should have information on Milo of Croton. The sources would be written in Italian, of course, but Myka could read them. Meanwhile Claudia had said she would try to find out more about the four missing archaeology students.

Myka spoke to the librarians and arranged to use a group study room. She left Pete there helping Claudia set up her tablet and whatever other portable technology she had brought on this trip, and went to the library stacks to find what she could about the ancient Olympic wrestler.

She returned with three books on ancient Greece and one on the history of the Olympic Games. She handed the latter to Pete. “Here. I actually found something that’s in English. Look up Milo of Croton.”

“Here’s what I found so far on our missing college students,” Claudia reported. “Typical social media pages and so forth. One of them, Jasmine Armstrong, used to do gymnastics, and was actually pretty good - she was winning local meets - until she was hospitalized the first time with severe asthma. She posted that after all this time she still misses it. Also, ever heard of Morrison and Judith Grouse?” 

“Yeah,” Pete answered. “Their company’s a juggernaut! They’re billionaires and all over the hoity-toity philanthropist socialite scene.”

“Well, another of our runaways, Piper Grouse, is their daughter.” 

“I thought their daughter’s name was Ashley,” Myka said.

“They have two daughters. Piper is the younger one.”

“That’s a problem,” Myka realized. “If she’s got money, that means resources and mobility.”

“Guys, further problem.” Claudia’s voice turned grim. “Miguel Sanchez grew up in the foster care system. I happen to know firsthand how bad that can be. He has a long history of running away from foster families, and it looks like he had good reason. Lots of reports of abuse and neglect. CPS moved him several times, but it seems all the families he was with sucked. Several months before he would’ve graduated from high school, he got his GED, probably secretly, and then ran away again. That time they never found him before he turned eighteen and they couldn’t force him to go back. The point is Miguel Sanchez knows how to disappear.”

“Then we’re going to have to try to think that way too,” Myka replied. 

Claudia’s phone beeped, and she grabbed it. “Dr. Singh’s texted me back. Unfortunately, she says the reason for the meeting at Milo’s house that ended so badly is unknown.” 

“Hey, speaking of Milo of Croton, listen to this!” Pete interjected. “That guy was awesome! They say he trained by carrying a full grown ox on his shoulders!” At Myka’s skeptical look, he pointed at the page of the book she had handed him. “Really! It says it right here!”

“Okay, Pete. What else does it say?” 

“He won the Olympic wrestling championship six times, and a ton of other wrestling titles too. The dude must have had a really impressive collection of laurel wreaths! Make that olive wreaths. Looks like that’s what they actually used for Olympic crowns.” Then Pete gasped. “Hey! What if one of Milo of Croton’s Olympic crowns is the artifact in the box?!” 

“Maybe, but why would that cause a sleeping sickness?” Myka wondered.

Pete shrugged. “Maybe it would make his competitors sleepy and slow? I don’t know, but it’s the only thing belonging to Milo of Croton that we’ve come up with.”

“Don’t forget Pythagoras,” Claudia pointed out. “You guys said the artifact might have to do with him.” 

Pete grimaced. “Pythagoras! I hate that guy. High school trigonometry class was sheer torture!”

“What are you finding, Claudia?” Myka asked. 

The young computer hacker’s fingers had been flying over her keyboard. “Not much,” she admitted. “There’s a kind of cup that he invented, called a Pythagorean cup. It’s a practical joke. It’s designed so that when it’s filled up past a particular point, the drink will spill out the bottom of the cup. Here’s a photo.” She showed Myka and Pete her computer screen.

“Wait, Pythagoras was a practical joker?” Pete laughed delightedly. “I love that guy! I’ve got to get me one of those cups!”

“In that case, I am never accepting a drink from you again!” Myka told him.

Claudia’s phone chimed just then, a different sound from when she had received the text message. “Hold on,” she said. “Uh-oh, we have yet another problem. I hacked the hospital’s computer system so we can keep track of the status of the sleeping sickness patients, and two more cases just arrived.”

“It’s spreading!” Pete said softly.

“We’re running out of time!” Myka added. “We need to call Artie now!”

“One Farnsworth call coming up!” Claudia acknowledged.

It was Steve who answered at the Warehouse. “Claudia! I’m glad you guys called,” he said. “Artie just detected a couple more cases of the sleeping sickness.”

“So did we, Jinksy!” she replied. “It means we’re running out of time. We’ve got a couple of ideas on what the artifact in the box might be: Milo of Croton’s Olympic crown, or the original Pythagorean cup!” 

“Pythagorean cup?”

“A prank wine goblet designed to spill the person’s drink,” Myka told him.

Steve shook his head. “No, I’m afraid that can’t be it.”

“Why not?” Myka asked.

“The box is too small to contain an Olympic crown or a wine goblet.”

“How do you know?”

“Because Artie and Mrs. Frederick and I discovered that the box is a replica of Pandora’s Box, and I just saw the real one.”

“Then the box itself is the artifact, and not something inside?”

“But we got multiple pings, Myka!” Claudia put in.

“Claudia’s right,” Steve confirmed. “The box is an artifact, and there’s also something inside. Is there anything else you can tell me?”

Claudia, Myka, and Pete brought Steve up to speed about everything they had learned. “…so we need to know if there’s anything in the Warehouse related to Milo of Croton or Pythagoras that can help us find the students or cure the sleeping sickness,” Myka finished. 

“Okay, I’ll ask Artie,” Steve replied. “I’ll call you back.”

 

Croton, Italy, the previous afternoon, March 14, 2013 A.D.

 

Piper Grouse paid the check for lunch for herself, Jasmine, and Hayley with cash. She was glad she’d gone to the ATM first thing this morning before their archaeology class had left for the dig site. She wouldn’t be able to use her credit card now.

The three girls headed for the door of the café. Before they could exit, the name of Milo of Croton in a news report on the television in the corner caught Piper’s ear. “Hang on a second!” she called to her friends. The reporter spoke in Italian, but with concentration Piper was mostly able to follow.

“A mysterious sleeping sickness has struck three of the university students working at the site,” the reporter said. “They are currently being treated at Marrelli Hospital. Police and university officials are looking for four additional students who suddenly ran off from the dig site and are also possibly affected. Just as a precaution, the rest of the class and their professor have been admitted to the hospital for observation.” 

“We’ve got to get out of here,” Piper hissed to Jasmine and Hayley. She was glad none of them were wearing university t-shirts. She ignored her friends’ confused looks as she ushered them out the door.

Once outside and away from the café, she told them about the news report.

Hayley’s eyes widened. “A sleeping sickness? Oh, my gosh, that must be what Miguel meant when he said that the box is evil! Do you think we’re at risk like they said on the news?”

Jasmine shook her head. “I haven’t felt this good in years.” She lowered her voice. “It’s weird, but I get the feeling these things we got from the box are protecting us, making us immune.”

Piper had the same sense. “I think so too. It’s not logical, but nothing about this entire day has been,” she said. 

“In that case, we mustn’t waste any more time!” Hayley urged. “Come on, let’s see if Miguel’s at the beach.”

 

South Dakota, March 15, 2013 A.D.

 

Steve hurried back to Artie’s office. He found his supervisor there engrossed in reading his computer screen. “Artie –“ Steve began.

“Not now!” Artie interrupted.

“Artie, this is important!” Steve insisted. “I just got off the Farnsworth with Myka and Claudia and Pete, and they think the artifacts have to do with either Milo of Croton or Pythagoras.”

“I know! They said so last time. I’ve started digging into the oldest files we’ve got archived from Warehouse 1. Unfortunately, these records are still two centuries removed from our target time period!”

“Do we have anything in the Warehouse that belonged to either of those guys? Myka says she needs to know.”

“Liar!” Artie yelled.

Steve startled. “What? I’m not lying, Artie. And aren’t I usually the one to call people out for lies?”

“No, no, Pythagoras’ lyre!”

“Pythagoras was a liar? Now you’ve really lost me.”

Artie made a frustrated noise as he turned to face Steve. “No! L-Y-R-E. Pythagoras played the lyre, the musical instrument! In fact, in his later years when he was running his school in Croton, if any of his followers got sick, he’d play for them, and it helped. Pythagoras therefore was the one who first came up with the concept of music therapy.”

“We have his lyre here?”

“Yes. It plays the music of the spheres, which was a Pythagorean cosmological and philosophical concept. Basically they thought the earth was the center of the universe, and the other planets and the sun and moon and stars each occupied a spherical space around the earth. Each one would emit its own harmonic resonance as it moved in its sphere, a frequency based on the planet’s speed. Pythagoras’ lyre plays those resonances. The music is captivatingly beautiful, and it has healing powers. It might cure the sleeping sickness!”

“Great! But what’s the downside?”

“You’ve been listening to Pete, haven’t you? The downside is that it plays the music of the spheres, which as I said is captivatingly beautiful. If you play it for too long, your mind starts being pulled into the cosmological void. You could end up catatonic, though you’d wake up eventually.”

“That does not sound appealing.” 

“Well, you may or may not be the one to play it. In any case, I’m sending you to Croton with the lyre. Go pack while I retrieve it. I’ll meet you at Leena’s.”

 

Croton, Italy, the previous evening, March 14, 2013 A.D.

 

The sun was setting, and Piper noted how Hayley’s shoulders were slumping. They’d been searching for hours, first at the beach and then in all the abandoned buildings they could locate. They had not found Miguel.

Piper was tiring too. She, Hayley, and Jasmine had just slipped into an old house with boarded up windows and a neglected yard. The only sounds were their own footsteps as they explored the ground floor. 

Jasmine then sprang up the stairs, calling “Miguel?”

Hayley wearily but determinedly followed.

Piper sighed and made her own way upward. 

At the top landing of the stairs, a wide hallway turned sharply to the left. From there all the second floor rooms were on the right side except for those on either end. The left side had a balcony-like railing and looked down upon the front foyer.

Piper had only gone a few steps down the hall when Jasmine came back, shaking her head. “He’s not here.”

Hayley reappeared out of one of the rooms. “I don’t think he was here earlier, either.” She looked dejected. “What are we going to do?”

“It’s getting late,” Piper observed, “and I’m tired. We need to figure out where we’re going to spend the night. We can continue searching tomorrow.”

“Let’s find somewhere to eat, too,” Hayley put in. “I’m starving.”

“We can’t go back to the dorm,” Jasmine warned.

“We can’t go to a hotel, either. My credit card could be tracked.” Piper added. “It’s probably what everyone looking for us would expect us to do, too.”

“Maybe we could stay here?” Hayley suggested. “Nobody knows where we are.”

Before Piper or Jasmine could respond, a loud crack sounded from above them, and the broken light fixture in the ceiling began falling toward their heads!

With lightning reflexes, Jasmine executed a gymnast’s tumble that took her out of its range and knocked Hayley out of the way as well. Hayley yelped and fell on her side, but found herself unhurt. Jasmine came up on her feet.

Piper was closest to the light and didn’t have the advantage of an athletic background. She shrieked and stumbled backward. The light crashed on the hardwood floor right by her toes and sprayed broken glass in all directions. Piper lost her balance and fell against the rail. She caught it and started trying to pull herself upright. Silence fell.

Jasmine helped Hayley to her feet. “Whoa. Are you guys okay?”

Hayley nodded.

Piper, still supporting herself against the rail, said, “I think so.” She didn’t see any glass cuts on her legs, and her breathing was slowing.

With a groan and a snap, the old, brittle wood of the rail gave way. Before Piper could even scream she was tumbling backward again!

Somehow she managed to catch the edge of the floor, but she knew she didn’t have the strength to pull herself up before she plummeted down to the lower floor.

A pair of small, strong hands seized her wrists. Hayley! 

“Hang on!” Hayley called. “Grab my arms!”

She sounded so confident that Piper did, and slowly, amazingly, the small dark girl was able to pull her slightly taller friend back up into the upper hall.

“Thanks, Hayley!” Piper gasped. “That was incredible, both of you! I saw that move, Jasmine. It’s like you guys have superpowers! ... It’s the dice, Hayley, it’s got to be; they’ve given you super strength! And Jasmine, that necklace has made you into a gymnast again!”

“This is awesome!” Jasmine exclaimed. Hayley too was grinning.

With a thrill Piper wondered if the stylus was going to give her a superpower too.

Then she sobered. “I think we’d better forget about staying here tonight,” she said. “In fact, I want to get out of here right now. This place is literally falling apart.”

“Okay. Then where do we go?” Jasmine asked. “You already said we can’t go to a hotel because that’s what people would expect us to do.”

Piper gave a slow smile as inspiration came to her. “That’s right, but what they would never expect would be for us to return to the dig site where we ran off from!” 

Jasmine and Hayley looked at her in surprise.

“Everyone from our class is at the hospital, so the bus we’re using from Magna Graecia University will still be parked right across the way in that rented garage,” Piper explained. “We can get the keys because Dr. Singh gave us the code for the storage bin at the orientation. We can spend the night on the bus. It won’t be comfortable, but it should be safe. There’ll also be bottled water, a first aid kit, and maybe some other things that might be useful there.” 

“That’s brilliant!” Jasmine replied. “I think we know what your superpower is now. You’re a genius!”

Hayley giggled. “And you sounded just like Dr. Singh just then!”

“Yeah, you did!” Jasmine agreed with amusement. “You had her exact inflections!”

Piper joined her two companions in laughter.

 

South Dakota, March 15, 2013 A.D., 4 pm Mountain Standard Time

 

Steve brought his travel bag downstairs into the dining room and waited, resigning himself to a very long airline flight. He didn’t like transatlantic flights. They were far too long to be sitting down in one place. Part of what he had liked about the ATF and now liked about being a Warehouse agent was that the work was active. He was usually physically doing something. If he could manage to go to sleep on a long flight, it helped, but that didn’t always happen.

Artie approached, carrying several items. On a strap around his shoulder he had an instrument bag, which Steve assumed contained Pythagoras’ lyre. In his hands Artie held an ancient-looking flat rectangular wooden box, on top of which sat a worn gray cobblestone. 

Mrs. Frederick followed Artie into the room. She stood in silence as Artie deposited the gig bag and the stone on the table, and handed the box to Steve. “Here,” he said. “Is there room in your bag for this?”

“I think so. What is it?”

“It’s the lost papers of Pythagoras. They were with the lyre. They’re not actually an artifact, though the agents who acquired them thought they were at first. Take them in case they might be useful.”

“Won’t they be written in ancient Greek?”

“Yes, but Claudia’ll probably have a techno trick that can translate them.”

“Okay.” Steve tucked the box into his duffel bag.

“And here’s the lyre.” Artie pulled out a seven-stringed harp-like instrument made from a tortoise shell and of a size that its ancient owner probably sat it on his lap to play it. He let Steve see the lyre, then returned it to the gig bag and handed it to him. “Don’t touch the strings.”

“Will they let me take this on the plane?” Steve wondered.

“You’re not going by plane,” Artie told him. “We don’t have that kind of time.”

“Then how am I going?” Steve asked warily.

“You’ll be using this,” Artie replied, holding up the cobblestone. “This is the first stone the ancient Romans laid down in 312 B.C.E. when they built the Via Appia, the first and most important Roman road. You’ve probably heard the saying ‘all roads lead to Rome’? Well, if you hold this stone in your hands, start walking along a road, and say that in Latin, you’ll be transported instantly to Rome.”

“A teleportation artifact? I thought those weren’t ever to be used.”

“Under the circumstances, utilizing this one seems our best option,” Mrs. Frederick said. “I’ve contacted the Regents, and they have authorized its use. Adwin Kosan is currently at the Vatican finishing up the matter of Magellan’s Astrolabe. When you arrive in Rome, his driver will meet you and take you to Croton. We’ve told the other agents that you’re coming.”

“Don’t worry. Of all the teleportation artifacts, this one is about the safest,” Artie said. “Just don’t use it too often, or you’ll be unable to leave Rome.”

Steve exhaled. “Right.” He squared his shoulders. “How do you say ‘all roads lead to Rome’ in Latin?”

Artie carefully put down the cobblestone before answering. “Omnes viae Romam ducunt.” 

“Got it.”

“Then let’s get you on your way. Grab the stone.”

Steve shouldered his belongings and the lyre, then picked up the cobblestone.

“Good luck, Agent Jinks,” Mrs. Frederick said.

“Thanks.” Steve went with Artie out the front door of Leena’s Bed and Breakfast, and they got into Artie’s 1957 Jaguar.

As they drove, Artie explained, “The Via Appia cobblestone is all about connecting any road to the Appian Way, so I’m going to take you to the highway outside Univille. That should be a major enough road that the stone can connect it from this distance. The shoulder of the merge ramp should be the perfect place. It even goes eastward, toward Rome.”

“Okay.”

A few minutes later, Artie pulled over on the shoulder of the road, and the two got out of the car. “You’ll be fine,” Artie said. “Just start walking and say the incantation.”

Steve took a deep breath, began walking, and said, “Omnes viae Romam ducunt.”

Nothing happened.

“Keep going!” Artie called. “Say it again! We’re far enough from Rome that the stone might have some trouble connecting the roads!”

Steve resumed walking, and enunciated louder, “Omnes viae Romam ducunt!”

The world blurred around him.

 

Rome, Italy, March 15, 2013 A.D., 11 pm. Central European Time

 

The next thing Steve knew, the sky was dark, and he found himself standing on a sidewalk surrounded by vibrant, bustling city nightlife. “I’m in Rome…” he murmured. He tucked the Via Appia cobblestone away in his bag, then slowly drank in the atmosphere of the scene around him. Next to him was a nightclub, brightly lit, crowded, and thunderous with music meant for dancing. Steve found the aura of carefree and adventurous fun infectious. A laughing young couple passed him by and went inside. 

Opposite the nightclub was an Irish pub, or the Roman version of one, if the image of a leprechaun holding a whiskey glass on the sign above the door was anything to go by. The pub was also brightly lit, and people were eating and drinking at every patio table outside. If Steve concentrated, he could just hear Irish fiddle music underneath the rock from the nightclub.

What an exciting city Rome was! Steve felt himself drawn forward to the street corner. There he stopped, and his eyes widened in wonder at one of the most magnificent sights he had ever seen: the Trevi Fountain. He’d seen photos of it before, but that was nothing like actually being here. The sculptures had such presence and grace, such significance and meaning! The way the water sparkled under the city lights was mesmerizing!

“Come on, let’s each throw a coin in the fountain!” Steve turned as the young tourist woman who had spoken in British-accented English held hands with the man beside her. “There’s a legend that says if you do, it ensures that you will return to Rome someday!”

Steve followed them at a distance and watched as the couple threaded their way through the crowd and approached the fountain, then turned their backs toward it. “Okay, now hold the coin in your right hand and throw it over your left shoulder,” the woman said. She demonstrated, and her companion emulated her. They both laughed a bit tipsily, then scurried off to wherever their next destination lay.

Steve couldn’t help smiling. Legend it might be, but as a Warehouse 13 agent, Steve had learned that legends sometimes had more than a little truth to them. He knew he had a mission to fulfill in Croton, but to return to Rome afterward, for a long vacation… the thought filled him with anticipation and longing. 

“Agent Jinks,” came a voice beside him. Steve turned to see a short dark man in a suit addressing him. “I’m Amiri Rihare, Regent Kosan’s driver.” He shook Steve’s hand. “I’ve come to take you to Croton.”

“So soon? Isn’t there a little time to explore Rome a bit before we go?” Steve asked.

“I’m afraid not, Agent Jinks.”

“Come on, just one hour. Half an hour! This city is enchanting!”

“Yes, I think enchanting is the word. The Via Appia cobblestone is probably affecting you. We should get you out of here.”

“Then please, just let me do one thing really quick!” Steve dropped his duffel bag, got a quarter out of his pocket, and with his right hand tossed it over his left shoulder into the Trevi Fountain. “I’ll be back, beautiful, fascinating Rome!” he promised.

Rihare picked up Steve’s duffel bag. “We definitely need to go now.” He started walking.

With great reluctance Steve followed him, Pythagoras’ lyre feeling heavy on his back.

**Author's Note:**

> The original characters in this story are completely original. They are not based on or named after any real people.
> 
> I used the following sources for information on ancient Greece, Roman roads, and the lives of Pythagoras of Samos and Milo of Croton:  
> The Music of Pythagoras by Kitty Ferguson, The Legacy of Pythagoras by T.D. Van Basten, Ancient Greece, second edition, by Sarah B. Pomeroy et al, and the Ancient History Encyclopedia (online).  
> I also stumbled onto the concept of the Pythagorean cup on interestingengineering.com.


End file.
